Import Investigation

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IGN takes a look at the import gaming phenomenon

By IGN Staff

Import gaming commands a good chunk of the games market in the US. While domestic publishers frown upon it, as it takes away some of the audience that may eventually buy the game, tons of gamers still spend inflated prices to play import games.

How many IGN-PSX readers played Final Fantasy VII as an import, even though they can't read Japanese? The popularity of import games may very well have a lot to do with the fact that the games come from Japan. Japanese culture is intriguing to most Westerners, with its distinctive anime styles and future-forward perspectives. To a lot of us, anything Japanese is cool. So it doesn't matter if you can't read the characters or not - it's still cool.

This isn't the only thing, of course. Final Fantasy VII was an exception because it was highly anticipated in Japan as well. A large part of it is down to the fact that the game may never come out here. Some games are deemed 'too Japanese,' a dubious thing in this age of Eastern awareness.

So what makes a game too Japanese? Any game with excessive anime or Hello Kitty-type characters used to be labelled too Japanese, but thankfully these are now viewed as cool by US publishers. One of the biggest causes for a game not coming out here is themes. Case in point: Square's mech RPG Xenogears won't come out here because it has controversial Christian religious themes, something Square feels may cause problems in the US.

Another reason is that Japanese gamers find certain things more entertaining than we do, and vice versa. Densha de Go! will probably never come out here, as it's a train simulator. It's purely cultural.

Finally, translation can hinder a game's chances of being released here. There are a ton of RPGs released every year in Japan that never make it to our shores (as every RPG fan knows too well) because of the lengthy, and expensive, translation. However, this may change as, thanks to Final Fantasy VII, RPGs are now seen as more profitable in the US.

Anime is breaking through into American television with Sailor Moon (if you can call that anime) and Dragon Ball Z, and manga is slowly gaining a foothold in the comics market. Hopefully more distinctly Japanese games, such as Tecmo's Monster Rancher, will find their way to US shores. There will be a lot of gamers waiting with open arms, we're sure.